


Tegan Trevelyan. Herald, Inquisitor, Mage, me.

by cynnamon



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-20
Updated: 2016-05-20
Packaged: 2018-06-09 15:52:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6913549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cynnamon/pseuds/cynnamon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Diaries, rambles, and short stories as written by/documenting Inquisitor Tegan Trevelyan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tegan Trevelyan. Herald, Inquisitor, Mage, me.

Twenty nine years and I am useless. No. Really. It's not self deprecating, it's honest. People get all up and arms when you say words like that, like they're not actually allowed to mean anything about anyone, but what the hell's the point if they aren't true sometimes? I might be useless but I'm not an idiot. And no, I know I have talents. I've got tons of knowledge on one thing or another but it's nothing without a practical use for it.  
I wasn't useless always. That knowledge was good for something once. But something doesn’t exist no more so what's the point in hiding it? Lunch menus, schedules, the best vantage point in the whole tower to throw a snowball, how to pick the broken lock to the storage room on the third floor, and which chambers smelled like shit most times. That's the sorta knowledge that I'm holding. And if it weren't obvious, that stuff is pretty niche. What does anyone care I knew which words to make Ser Howden lose his marbles and reel 'em in again now that the bastard's dead? Or all the short cuts I'd mapped now that Ostwick is as good as a ghost town, if not already a pile of rubble?  
“You've got your spells.” They tell me but that's a laugh, really. Great. I got the one thing that got us all in this mess. Use 'em and I'm good as dead. Don't and I'm as good as gone too, really. But I guess I might as well know how ta catch a man's breeches on fire if he's gonna be killin' me anyway.  
Anyway, it's not like it matters. All that's shit now too, I guess. Useless or not, I gotta find a way ta be somethin'. All them left from Ostwick must be laughin'.  
... I wonder if they know about me. I mean, they gotta. Half'a Thedas knows now, right? But knowin' it's someone ain't knowin' it's me.  
Hah. They always said that the name 'Tegan Trevelyan' was meant ta mean something. They mean't my dad was a Bann, of course. But it's gonna mean somethin' now, one way or another. For however long I can keep the world from ending anyway.  
Shit. Who'da thought? Not these guys, that's for sure. 'Sept for maybe Solas. Still can't get that one figured out. Though, really, I don't know I know how ta get a read on anybody. 'Sept for the fact that they all seem keen to stop this. Or, I think they do anyway. Still can't tell with Solas. Don't think I'll ever tell much of anything with him. That's one mystery I'm never understandin'. Though I guess that's on more than the shady elf guy. Leliana and Cassandra seem pretty keen on keepin' shut too, as far as I can see. 'Specially Leli. Damn the girl's creepy. Though I mean that in a good way. Really. I can appreciate a smile that looks as much happy as it means she's gonna kill you. It does her job, anyway. And as far as I can see we wouldn't be much of anywhere without it. Cassie either. Though she's the one that's really confusin' me. Sure I can't tell if Leli's gonna hug me or kill me but it's an act, ya know? A part of this game she's playin' with everybody. Cassie seems to think I'm the single most important mistake to ever grace the bottom of those kickass boots she's always wearin'. Like I gotta be this Herald but she wants the Herald to be anyone but me, really.  
I don't know. She doesn't seem to like me. I like her, though, which I guess counts for something. I don't know. It seems like everyone's playin' at somethin' and I'm the only one who ain't gettin' it. Must be an outworlder thing. Varric seems to think so too, anyway. Though he seems to understand a hell of a lot more about it. Been playin' the game longer, I guess. Gotta wonder if he's the one we should all really get nervous about. He keeps sayin' how it's everyone else who's better at it but so far as I can see he's the only one who can play every side of it. Never met a man that everyone swears up and down is trustworthy and also always lying before I met Varric Tethras. And I don't think there's a person here who don't like him. 'Sept Cassandra, of course. But there's times I wonder she likes anyone. The man's got my respect anyway. And I think, secretly, you could trust even that much from Cassie. Which is why if Solas and Leliana ain't plannin' something secret and shady, he's the next I'd place my bet on. He or Josie.  
For someone who does so much of everything important here it's kinda weird how easy it is to forget about her. Maybe 'cuz you never see her. She's always sittin' in that room, writin' and planin' and sendin'. Working every string while the rest of us see nothin'. Or I don't, anyway. Maybe the others do. Someone's gotta see her outside of the war council. Or maybe not. I don't know.  
Damn... the more I think on it the more I realize just how much everyone is always workin'. And what do I do? I'm supposed to be this herald thingy, but really, I think that mostly it just makes me the mascot. They bring me around as they do all the important business and every now 'an then I point at the sky. See ya later green glowy rifty. Then they hide me away an' go back to their business. Let me pretend I'm makin' decisions at the big boy table while Josie and Cassie and Leli and Curls do all the real work.  
See. Useless. Twenty nine years in a Circle an' I'm certified to throw fire and babble like a kiddie while the grown ups get their jobs done. And even then it's mostly Varric and Cullen who actually let me babble. The others turn me away. No cookies if I don't go play and let the grown ups get their work done before supper. Varric makes time, but he ain't really a part of all the big bad world endin' stuff. So far as I can see anyway. And it's probably just another part of the way he plays the game they're all playin'. I'm not so sure with Cullen. He doesn't seem to be playing anything, really. Just wants to do his job and get his work done. Maybe he's the greatest player of all. The suspicion list might need some reevaluatin'. But nah. I'm not really that suspicious of any of 'em. Most times. It's just... I don't know. Fun or easier if I pretend there's a code I can crack here. If my enemy's in front of me it's all a little less scary.  
Kinda funny that of all the enemies I pretend to see in front of me the Templar didn't make the list, yeah? Though he ain't really a Templar anymore. Still got his ties to 'em though. But I don't know. There's something about him that I just don't see as all that scary. Maybe I've run outta all my fear for that lot. Though, heh. I think those at Ostwick thought I never had enough of it. I don't know. Sure they're scary but, what's that old saying? The enemy you know is better than the one you don't? The outworld's a whole big enemy I got nothin' on. Templars? That's just same old same old. And of all the Templar's I've known... well. Curls isn't the most scary.  
Cullen's kinda great, actually. I like talkin' to him, anyway. I mean, I guess I'm taking AT him, most days. But that's kinda how it's always been, with most people, and I don't think he hates it. I hope he doesn't, anyway. I mean, he talks back sometimes so that's gotta be good, yeah? Unless, you know, it was “go away” or “shut up” or “stop talking to me”. But he's never said any of those that I know of. Might just be too awkward or shy to say 'em. But I like him. I don't know, I guess it's just... familiar. Babblin' at Templars, ya know. Closest thing I got ta home here. I guess he kinda reminds me of Ser Rillan a little. He used to let me babble too, with the same kinda awkward and focused indifference. I can't believe...  
I mean, maybe it ain't the same. Could be he really doesn't give a hoot what I'm really saying. But there's a familiarity in it that I don't think I'm mistakin'. An' he usually seems ta know what I've been sayin' mostly. Even if it looks like he wasn't listenin'. He was a Templar once so it's probably still trained in him. That detachment. Not allowed to socialize with the Mage lot, so he can't actually be listenin'. Can't personalize. We were the same way, most times. The Mages. With Templars and each other. Couldn't personalize. Get too close seemin' and they suspect you of all sortsa things. So I guess this is just how I'm comfortable now.  
That's kinda fucked up, yeah? It's weird ta think, really. Livin' it you always and never really think about it. Can't really explain it if you haven't lived it. People seem most like that out here too though. That whole game thing. Never straight sayin' what they're really sayin' and thinkin' and feeling. Guess it's always dangerous to share, no matter where you are. Just as many people carrying swords around to kill ya.  
I didn't expect that, out here. Not really. Don't know what I was but... I guess I wasn't expectin' the end of the world either. Certainly not ta be the big hero who's got ta end it.  
Not the world, I mean. The world ending. The thing tryin' to end it.  
Kinda funny, yeah? They always said I'd spend my life fighting demons. Doubt this is what anyone was expectin'. Maybe that's how I'm so calm about the all of it.  
Maybe that training wasn't so useless after all.


End file.
